Marines Campaign Blues

[bstarr]

I love the story line and by themselves the scenarios would be great, but damn the Marine Campaign is hard. I firmly beleive the most annoying poster in any gaming forum is the whinner who says "I'm not good at this so I don't like it" and I don't want to be that guy, but, seriously, the last three scenarios have been so difficult I sometimes feel like I'm playing a fancy version of Panzer General from the 90s - "Whoops, I lost a tank. Time to restart at my last save or I'll never win another battle" and "nevermind tactics; watch that clock." Right now I think every vehicle I have has damaged wheels from having to haul ass in rough terrain due to enemy fire (although not that many have been lost because I save a lot ); my squads are starting to look like teams so I've started save/restarting for them as well; and I might as well send my artillerists forward with rifles since they've forgotten what a shell even looks like.

I love the game and I even like everything about the campaign except for the level of difficulty. There wouldn't happen to be a "Baby Version" somewhere, would there?

[SpitfireXI]

Yeah, I previously posted on this and can agree with you. The missions I found really frustrating were the ones where intelligence tells you to expect t-72's and gives to a couple of javelin teams and a spotter to deal with it. I basically had to hide the entire time and hope I would get reinforcements that never came. However, having finished the campaign last night I was suprised that I pulled off a minor victory although I did not feel I had won.

[Field Marshal Blücher]

IMO the Marines campaign is by far the most frustrating of the three. I've never finished it even though I've finished both the vanilla and Brits campaigns on Elite. No offense to the scenario designers who clearly put a lot of effort into the Marines campaign, but I find myself ragequitting so often when I'm playing that campaign that I've just given up on it. This is all the more difficult for me because I LIKE the Marines more than either of the other forces.

[bstarr]

IMO the Marines campaign is by far the most frustrating of the three. I've never finished it even though I've finished both the vanilla and Brits campaigns on Elite. No offense to the scenario designers who clearly put a lot of effort into the Marines campaign, but I find myself ragequitting so often when I'm playing that campaign that I've just given up on it. This is all the more difficult for me because I LIKE the Marines more than either of the other forces.

My feelings to the tee. I love the module; and most of the scenarios in the campaign are great and would make excellent stand-alone scenarios, but when taken as a whole the campaign is just too difficult.

[Field Marshal Blücher]

I think JonS was working on releasing some of the Marines campaign scenarios as standalones, so maybe we will get our wishes!

I just want to reiterate that I think that the USMC campaign designers did a great job. I've seen the dedication that these guys put into the Brits scenarios (I wasn't a tester back in the USMC Module days), and it's truly impressive. There are just a bunch of individually insignificant things about the campaign that end up frustrating me too much to continue.

[Pandur]

i admit the marines campain was though, but nothing a tricky and calculating player can not manage.

what i miss is a clear list of what equipment you field in the campain. if you are somewhat reckless with youre tanks and you happen to have one or zero left after pooh youre screwed. if you would know you have only 4 tank for the whole campain it would be easier to calculate how much risk this particulart tank can take in whatever situation. same with troops. but since you dont know for sure sometimes you push it a little too far and there goes one of only four tanks, and that is noticable throughout the rest of the campain.

or to put it like that, the value of the single pices of equipment you have is only noticed after they are lost. at first its just a tanks of dont know how many, but after oyu lost two you beginn to notice that there are only two left...and so on. a clear listing of what the core units are would help dramaticaly i think.

[costard]

One of the last briefing lines for the Marine Campaign is "Take care of your troops and they'll take care of you." It really does apply - you need to conserve lives and ammunition to have a hope, and the fewer casualties you take the more options you have later on.

[JonS]

what i miss is a clear list of what equipment you field in the campain. ... if you would know you have only 4 tank for the whole campain it would be easier to calculate how much risk this particulart tank can take in whatever situation. same with troops. but since you dont know for sure sometimes you push it a little too far and there goes one of only four tanks, and that is noticable throughout the rest of the campain.

... a clear listing of what the core units are would help dramaticaly i think.

From the campaign initial briefing:

2nd MEB(REIN), with 26th MEU(SOC) under command, is the prime USMC component of the invasion of Syria. 2nd MEB(REIN) is supported by MAG-29, and elements of the US 5th Fleet.

The GCE of 26th MEU(SOC) is based around BLT 2/6 – the 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines. This battalion consists of:

* HQ Co

* Echo Co (Mechanized)

* Fox Co (Helo)

* Golf Co (Mechanized)

* Weapons Co (distributed amongst rifle companies)

* Scout & Sniper Plt

* CAAT Plt

Under command to 26th MEU(SOC) – and thus BLT 2/6 – are:

* Lima Btry (6 x 155mm M777 Howitzers)

* 3rd Tank Plt (4 x M1A1 FEP Abrams)

* 1st LAR Plt (6 x LAV)

* 1st Recon Plt

* 2nd Engineer Plt

* 3rd AAV Plt (13 x AAV-7A1)

* Transport elements from CLB-26

snips

Glossary:

AAV - Amphibious Assault Vehicle

BLT – Battalion Landing Team

Btry - Battery

CLB - Combat Logistics Battalion

Co - Company

FEP - Firepower Enhancement Program

GCE - Ground Combat Element

HQ - Headquarters

LAR - Light Armored Reconnaissance

LAV - Light Armored Vehicle

MAG - Marine Air Group

MEB(REIN) - Marine Expeditionary Brigade (Reinforced)

MEU(SOC) - Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations Capable)

Plt - Platoon

I really don't see how the amount of kit you have could be made any clearer - do you?

Two of the USMC Campaign scenaruios ("USMC 06 Route Recon" and "USMC 17 SNAFU") are up on the respository. These two have a very bare-bones H2H capability, but the Syrian player in a H2H should probably have the option creating larger setup zones. It's up to the other designers when or if the others will be released.

A H2H version of the campaign has also been released (on the repository), but again it is very bare-bones.